Saturday, June 29, 2013

Campfire Cocktail S'mores Bars

I know, you're thinking...S'mores...Again?! Ah, but I don't think these are your little sister's S'mores. These rich and gooey and luscious and oh, so boozy, S'more are definitely Big Girl S'mores. Kinda like the difference between flower panties and a black-lacy thong. Right?I've been wanting to experiment with a boozy version of a traditional Hershey's S'more for quite some time. I've seen cupcakes and bars, of course. There are tons of them out there in foodie blogger land. Adding booze can be tricky and this bar is a boozy experiment success (or so my taste testers have told me this past week). Love when that happens...And, my friends, I found my inspiration for this recipe from the strangest of places: watching Sandra Lee's show (I know...I was very, very bored one Friday night) about bars and lounges (why SL was picked for this, I have no idea). On one trip, she visited a very cool bar, Boulevard 3 in Los Angeles, which serves a Campfire Martini. Oh, yeah. You KNOW I tried that puppy that very evening. I had everything cuz you already know we have the most amazing liquor cabinets at BIWB. Easy, too. Equal parts whiskey (Tullamore D.E.W., of course), Baileys, Kahlua and half-n-half (my version). Shaken over ice and poured oh-so-smoothly in a chocolate swirled martini glass. It was served with a marshmallow coated in graham cracker crumbs. I didn't have those, but that sure didn't stop me.One of the BEST after dinner dessert drinks on this planet...Trust me!So, today I bring you my version of the Campfire Cocktail S'mores Bar {with Tullamore D.E.W.}. Yeah, you know it's good. You know you want this, not just in the summer, but ALL-YEAR-LONG! You don't have to wait for your next barbecue to make these, either.And, who says you can't have your S'mores in one neat, portable bar?

Get all your ingredients ready, preheat your oven and get that pan ready! With this assortment of ingredients the anticipation was killing me in the hopes that this experiment would work...

Combine
the dry ingredients and set aside.

Cream the butter and sugars by beating on medium until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes.

Add the eggs, one at a
time, beating with each addition. Add
the vanilla, Kahlua and Baileys.

With the mixer on lowest
speed, gradually add the flour mixture. Mix
until just combined. It's important to finish this by hand to keep the batter tender.

Press 1/2 the dough in
the bottom of the prepared pan. Use your fingers, mmkay?

Bake for
15-18 minutes or until lightly brown.
Removed from the oven.

Immediately arrange a layer of the
Hershey bars over the bottom layer, breaking the bars as needed. The first time I made these, sans booze, I used the smaller milk chocolate bars. I like this version, much, much better. This time, I felt there was a better balance of each component.

Sprinkle the mini marshmallows over the
chocolate bars. At this point, I knew these s'mores bars would be amazing. Plus, mini marshmallows are just so cute.

Gently scatter the
remaining batter over the marshmallows with a cobble stone effect. Sprinkle the Irish whiskey over the batter. You ask, "why not just add the whiskey to the batter." Well, the original recipe didn't call for any liquids in the cookie bar batter. The Baileys and Kahlua were already in the batter, and I wanted this to still have a cobbley effect. Too much liquid and I'd just have cake and not bars. So, the decision to sprinkle was made. Turns out, this actually caused the whiskey to kinda seep down to the chocolate layer almost making a chocolate whiskey ganache layer down there.

Amazing...Experiment successful!

Please note: I used my fair share of graduated cylinders in chem labs in college, now I use graduated shot glasses. So cool!

Bake as directed until you see this: lightly browned top with just a bit of marshmallow oozing
out. Try to wait and let them cool. And, I have to tell you, these smelled SO GOOD. Just like the Campfire Martini. No lie.

Cut into bars. Yeah, I know you know that part. I did refrigerate a bit, just sayin'.

P.S. These are great heated in the microwave for 10 seconds. Trust me.

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